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Artisan Cutlery Archaeo M390 Folding Knife

Artisan Cutlery Archaeo M390 Folding Knife

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Product Description
Made from the best of the best, the Artisan Cutlery Archaeo is all business. Aesthetically speaking, it looks like something you could take out at a dinner banquet and no one would bat an eye Read More

Customer Reviews

4.0
(4 reviews)
5star
(1)
4star
(2)
3star
(1)
2star
(0)
1star
(0)
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Barrettboy
2
Apr 10, 2019
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Detent is so strong that the lock-bar bends when you go to deploy the blade, and you can't open it at all using the thumbhole. Otherwise a great knife.
Kavik
5531
Feb 22, 2019
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4 stars is a little too high, but 3 would be way too low...needs a couple design changes to become a 5 star piece This is now my new "sharpest out of the box edge". Very impressively done. Catches hairs well above the skin along the whole length of the blade. Despite the thin handle, it's rather comfortable to hold. And for the size, it carries like a much smaller knife in the pocket. Grinding and milling all look great, the CF inlay is gorgeous and sits ALMOST perfectly flush with the handle. Not quite perfect, but damn close. Action is incredibly smooth. Deploys well whether using the flipper as a light switch or a push button. Middle finger flips just as well. Thumb CAN work, but I find it too awkward to keep my fingers off the lockbar for that grip. Drops shut like a dream. Hardware is all top notch as well. Everything except the pivot screw had pretty strong loctite on it, but I didn't have a single screw even think about stripping on me. A very nice surprise from a company I wasn't really sold on before.
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And i absolutely love how they handled attaching the CF with hidden screws and threaded inserts from the back. No external screws ruining the looks, and no epoxy that might fail down the road, or hinder those of us who might want to re-anodize at some point. Same for the pocket clip's hidden screws. Even the lanyard option with the rod insert in the spine, instead of a hole drilled through...every bit of the design work is just so sleek. The issues i have with it though: 1) The designer described the detent as being very strong, unable to whip it open without using the flipper without an unreasonable amount of effort.....well, i can whip mine open with just wrist action, no arm movement... Not great 😒 limits legal carry in many places. I believe the reason for this is the incredible amount of sideways flex in the lockbar. Not sure if from the shape, the length of the cutout, or the material... But I can expose the tip quite a bit before the detent releases:
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(^detent still engaged at that point, more detail can be found in my post in the comments) I believe if this was remedied, it wouldn't fail the centrifugal/gravity assist opening test, as the detent ball and hole engage very solidly. 2) QC missed this mess on the flipper tab
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Not exactly sure what it is. Looks like old black corrosion...on a new, stainless blade? Luckily it's raised instead of pitted, but I'm still going to need to finish scraping it off then polish out the mark that's left 3) something isn't quite lining up between the blade and the handle, it's as if the blade is twisted just a hair at the pivot. So minute that I can't quite say what it is yet, but there's something. If I center the tip when closed, the middle of the blade sits closer to the show side. If i center the blade, the tip is off a hair. I'll have to try swapping around the bearings and races to see if it makes a difference, but I haven't had time to tear it down again yet. 4)the recess for the lockbar release is way too small. Both in length and in width difference between the front and rear handles. If the cutout in the front side were a little lower it would be much easier to get a thumb in there. You've only got about an 1/8" at most to catch on. And it's all within about a half inch of the base of the blade. Which leads me to the final design issue... 5) this freaking guy:
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With how close you have to be to release the lockbar, that hook on the back of the flipper catches my thumb every damn time. But check that CF pattern in the last pic though 😍 Gorgeous. Only other change I would make, and this isn't a negative, but if it were up to me: I'd like to see the cutout in the blade tweaked just a little bit. Have the lower line running more parallel to the handle when in the closed position, and elongate it just a bit, then give it more chamferring around the hole. I think that would fit better visually, and make the middle finger flick easier. Something like this (if you'll excuse the sloppy finger painting over a crappy cell phone pic)
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Overall, I really like it. But I do feel it could use a little fine tuning, given the price.
Flyfishermanmike
68
Oct 24, 2019
KavikDid you make your BB/epoxy table? It's very cool!
Kavik
5531
Oct 24, 2019
FlyfishermanmikeYep, I did! Thanks :) It's just a tray though, not a whole table Was my first test with pouring epoxy, was a very tedious project lol
NapzzZ
2
Apr 17, 2019
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lotar
3
Mar 27, 2019
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